Back in stock: Techno (All)

Review: Berlin's Exit Strategy began their 12"s game releasing EPs in browned sleeves, shortly before branching out into digital-vinyl combo releases with original artwork in the 2020s. Now with over ten years of experience under their belts, they welcome five new artists for a playful bricolage in deep and minimal techno, privileging elite, razor-sharp additive sound design and future-soulful vocal tasters. Ivory's opener 'Rain' epitomises this, while Jimi Jules squelchifies the same formula, and Aera's 'Future Holdings' rolls out the same logic to its ultimate conclusion, veering towards complex, 3D-graphic melodic techno composed entirely of climbing saws.

Review: M.A.N.D.Y and Booka Shade's creative collaboration brought us some of the most inspired tech-house and off-kilter house anthems of the noughties, not least 'Body Language' and 'O Superman', a Laurie Anderson-sampling number that was one of the most recognisable club cuts of 2008. Here it gets a fresh vinyl pressing, with the German outfit accompanying a freshly remastered take on their original mix (A1) with various old and new reworks. The fresh Man Power revision (A2) is the standout - a slow build delight that sees the long-serving Geordie producer reach for boisterous jazz-house breaks, raw TB-303 trickery, weighty bass and tidy tech-house stabs. The EP also boasts SIS's 2020 deep tech-house rub and Robag Wruhme's brilliant 2008 minimal techno re-wire, which remains one of the German's most impactful and off-kilter revisions.

Review: Brenda's debut for Rupture LDN is a love letter to the dancefloor in all its phases, from early anticipation to late-night transcendence. Hailing from the UK and embedded in the country's long rave lineage, she draws on 4x4 jungle techno, deep d&b and spoken word to map out a personal and emotional arc. 'Come Undone' captures the energy of the night in full swingirushing breaks, euphoric pressure, the kind of track that commands the room. Elsewhere, 'Benda Brenda' and 'Total Danger' are raw-edged and jungle-rooted, while 'Rolling With Fabio' is deeper and more rolling. It all closes on 'A Deep Shade of Rave (Outro)', a poem dedicated to her long-running Ferry to the Underworld sessions at Corsica Studios. Spiritually full, physically rinsedithis EP nails what it means to live for the rave.